UPDATE- How to know to stop turning if I don't know when day 18 is?

[Chellester]

A neighbor gave me some eggs, and they were supposed to be fresh laid, but after a few days, I candled them and found that one of them was quite a bit more developed than the rest!

What I think happened is this egg was being sat on by one of his hens and my neighbor didn't realize it. Anyway, since I have no idea when it began to develop, I have no idea when to stop turning it.

So, my questions are: Why am I supposed to stop turning on day 18 in the first place? And what will happen if I don't stop turning? Is there any way I can tell the chick is close to hatching?

 

[jimnjay]

I assume you have candled to determine that it is farther along than the others. You need to compare the air cell to determine when they are ready to hatch. See the chart below. Staggered hatches are hard to manage. If it were me, I would leave this egg alone and see if it hatches. You will be torn between doing what is right for this one or for the rest of your eggs. When you see the air cell is where it should be you might improvise a hatcher by using a hanging light and a plastic container of some sort. Damp cloths can be used to provide humidity.

You need to stop turning eggs because they need to position themselves to pip into the air cell and it they are constantly jostled they can't get situated properly to hatch. On day 21 the air cell will be even bigger and you might see the beak protruding into the air cell when candled.

 

[Chellester]

Jimnjay, thank you very much for the information.

As far as I can tell by the diagram you provided, the egg is somewhere in between day 14 and day 18. I agree with you that I should not risk the rest of the hatch over this one egg. I have 20+ other eggs in the incubator right now, and I am going to try to do what I can for this one, but the rest of the hatch definitely comes first.

As far as setting up a temporary incubator, that's a great idea. I did order a hatching incubator for my other eggs before I knew about the situation with this one, but it is not due to come in until the end of the week. That's probably not in time to take care of this one egg, so I will see if I can set up something temprorary and go from there.

Thanks again!

 

[Chellester]

Just wanted to update everyone on the "early" egg!

I found out that the other incubator I ordered is on backorder, and wouldn't even be here on time to use as a hatching incubator for all my other eggs, so I went out to a brick-and-mortar store today and bought another incubator. I'll put in the early egg as soon as the air cell looks like its on the 18th day. Now let's see if it actually hatches!!! I'll keep everyone posted.

 

[jimnjay]

Its always nice to have an extra incubator around for emergencies. I hope you were able to cancel the order for the other one.